Medical patients are often placed on an intravenous (i.v.) drip line. Typically this i.v. line is fed from a source such as a 1 liter bag of some per-cent saline or some percent glucose. Typically the line has junction points and insertion points. The junction points allow one i.v. drip line to attach to another line. An insertion points, sometimes combined with one or more junction points, allows for the injection into the line of medication, typically by a syringe adapted to be inserted temporarily into the insertion point.
One goal which doesn't appear to be satisfactorily solved is to make the i.v. drip line extensible so that a patient, for example, is able to get out of bed, while attached to the i.v. drip line and traverse a distance to a bathroom and then return to bed, without having to roll along an i.v. source (“bag”) holder. The bag holder is typically a relatively large and heavy object extending upward and on rollers or wheels. If the patient currently needs to move around, the patient must move the i.v. bag holder along with him or her. This tends to be awkward, especially for a quick trip to the bathroom.
An ideal approach to solving this problem would to have an extensible i.v. tube that could extend and return to its place of origin. This ideal approach would use existing i.v. tubing and such junction points and insertion points which already exist, are approved for medical use by the Food and Drug Administration.
One difficulty can be noted up front: the i.v. tubing is very flexible and relatively of small diameter and relatively thin walled. This difficulty may preclude some direct approaches to answering the question of how to translate the desired result into a workable apparatus.
It is of interest to review prior art. In this conjunction it is noted that at least in one's typical experience in a modern hospital, no such extensible i.v. lines have been encountered. This is based on the inventor's anecdotal experiences.